Goodbye 2010, Hello 2011!

Hello Readers!

It's almost the end for the year 2010, and in a few more days, the Earth will complete it's orbit, circling the Sun. After many years past, human tries hard on exploring the universe, unrevealed and tried to solve many mysterious that beyond human's imagination. Space Explorations have been growing rapidly fast in these past few years. Many countries such America, Russia and Canada had discovered and explore our universe beyond the solar system. And many other countries such as India and China also had started to involve in these Space Explorations field.

By sending and making many types of space probes, rockets and even astronomical telescopes, Space Exploration had changed most of human's lifestyle. People may not know, that things and gadgets we used today, are from the Space Exploration Programme. Laptops, Internet, Communications Devices are all from the research from the programme. Even simplest things; such as fire fighters' suits, is actually the same material as the astronaut used as spacesuit.

In order to increase the human lifestyle for a better way of living, Space Exploration had cost so much money and even lives. Every missions sometimes give a success and failure results; and it's really needs a lot of patients and a strong heart to make the mission success! In this year, 2010; China's and India's rockets had exploded while take off to send their satellites to the moon. America also had lost their Space Shuttle Columbia and Challenger in their mission on ISS (International Space Station). As human, we make mistakes, and from mistakes we learnt for a better idea.

In the future, Space Explorations field will grow more rapidly as the technology gets more advance; and could help human go further beyond our planet in resolving mysteries in our universe. In 2020, NASA had planned to go back to moon. The preparation had almost complete, as NASA had already started to test their new Ares IV engine's rocket, the new lunar rover, the new spacesuit; that help the astronaut to be able to suits the environment in space and other preparations. This shown how much serious they are in this mission.

Now you could know that how Space Explorations, help and impact our daily life and helping human towards a better way of living. There are lots to discover and learn about our universe and I am really hope to have your feedback or any comments and ideas that could help my blog towards a better understanding. It's almost 3 years for me, creating this blog; Star-Lunac, and I do really enjoy blogging and share with you informations and ideas about Astronomy and Space Explorations. And now, Star-Lunac has a new author that help me, updating this blog and share with all about the outer space and the universe. Thus, feel free to comment or contact us if you had any ideas or questions to know so that we could improve our blog's management.

I think that's all for now, and I wish you all a very Happy New Year and Happy Holidays! ^,^

- If you want to know more about NASA's review missions in 2010, click here.

*I'm sorry I couldn't share with you any new year's banner for this year; either from me or NASA, as I couldn't have much time to do one.

Comets

A comet is an icy small Solar System body that, when close enough to the Sun, displays a visible coma (a thin, fuzzy, temporary atmosphere) and sometimes also a tail. These phenomena are both due to the effects of solar radiation and the solar wind upon the nucleus of the comet. Comet nuclei are themselves loose collections of ice, dust, and small rocky particles, ranging from a few hundred meters to tens of kilometers across. Comets have been observed since ancient times and have historically been considered bad omens.

Comets have a wide range of orbital periods, ranging from a few years to hundreds of thousands of years. Short-period comets originate in the Kuiper Belt, or its associated scattered disc, which lie beyond the orbit of Neptune. Longer-period comets are thought to originate in the Oort Cloud, a spherical cloud of icy bodies in the outer Solar System. Long-period comets plunge towards the Sun from the Oort Cloud because of gravitational perturbations caused by either the massive outer planets of the Solar System (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune), or passing stars. Rarehyperbolic comets pass once through the inner Solar System before being thrown out intointerstellar space along hyperbolic trajectories.

Comets are distinguished from asteroids by the presence of a coma or a tail. However, extinct comets that have passed close to the Sun many times have lost nearly all of their volatile ices and dust and may come to resemble small asteroids. Asteroids are thought to have a different origin from comets, having formed inside the orbit of Jupiter rather than in the outer Solar System.These have somewhat blurred the distinction between asteroids and comets (see centaurs and asteroid terminology).

As of May 2010 there are a reported 3,976 known comets of which about 1,500 are Kreutz Sungrazers and about 484 are short-period.This number is steadily increasing. However, this represents only a tiny fraction of the total potential comet population: the reservoir of comet-like bodies in the outer solar system may number one trillion. The number visible to the naked eye averages roughly one per year, though many of these are faint and unspectacular.Particularly bright or notable examples are called "Great Comets".

Source : wikipedia

R2 [Robonaut 2] will aboard on ISS!

Almost 200 people from 15 countries have visited the International Space Station, but the orbiting complex has so far only ever had human crew members – until now.

Robonaut 2, the latest generation of the Robonaut astronaut helpers, is set to launch to the space station aboard space shuttle Discovery on the STS-133 mission. It will be the first humanoid robot in space, and although its primary job for now is teaching engineers how dexterous robots behave in space, the hope is that through upgrades and advancements, it could one day venture outside the station to help spacewalkers make repairs or additions to the station or perform scientific work.

R2, as the robot is called, will launch inside the Leonardo Permanent Multipurpose Module, which will be packed with supplies and equipment for the station and then installed permanently on the Unity node. Once R2 is unpacked – likely several months after it arrives – it will initially be operated inside the Destiny laboratory for operational testing, but over time both its territory and its applications could expand. There are no plans to return R2 to Earth.

Source : NASA

More on Interactive feature about Robonaut

Moon Falls Down On Hill

Hello!

It has been a while since I haven't updated my blog. I'm sorry and actually I felt guilty because letting it "untouched" for a very long time.

Now, I live with a new life, a new journey as a collage's student. As this month now, is a special month for Muslim, that is Ramadan. Last two night was the 15th days of fasting or we call it "puasa" in Malay. What I want to share is the scenery that caught my attention that night. As I woke up at 4.45 am in the morning, for the early feast (sahur) I could see the Moon, shines brightly as never! It's light a giant lamp that shines our Earth!

Then at 7.00am, it's started to set. And it looks really set on the top of the hill! It's look really... Gosh~ I can't find the exact word. But it looks very pretty!

The moon! It lands on top of the hill! ^,^

Time : 7.00am

Place : Puncak Alam, Selangor, Malaysia

After a few minutes later, the moon fade away from my view. And the sun starting to rise and shines our land...

Note : I'm sorry about the quality of the picture. I took the pictures using my phone.

Reusable Solid Rocket Motor and Solid Rocket Boosters

The Sequence

The reusable solid rocket motor, or RSRM, is assembled and tested by ATK Thiokol Propulsion near Promontory, Utah.

Each motor consists of four steel tubes, or segments, lined with 1.1 million pounds of solid fuel propellant. An igniter is installed in the forward segment and a nozzle in the aft segment.

The RSRM segments are shipped by rail to NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

At Kennedy, the RSRM segments are joined with subassemblies built by United Space Alliance, including the forward assembly, aft skirt, frustum and nose cap.

These structures contain the booster guidance system -- the hydraulics system that steers the nozzles, booster separation motors and parachutes.

The combination of the reusable solid rocket motor segments and solid rocket booster subassemblies make up the flight configuration solid rocket boosters, or SRBs.

The SRBs come to life when the thrust vector control, or TVC, system is activated 28 seconds before launch.

After the main engines are running, the boosters are ignited by an electrical spark that sends flames from the igniter down the center of the propellant.

The boosters go to full power in two-tenths of a second. At the same time, the hold-down nuts are severed, and the shuttle lifts off.

The propellant in the forward segment of the RSRM is designed to provide fast acceleration, burning out 50 seconds after launch.

The speed of the SRBs causes them to coast upward for 13 miles before beginning their fall into the ocean.

The remaining propellant is shaped to burn at a slower rate to reduce stress on the vehicle and the crew during the period of maximum dynamic pressure, or max Q.

After about two minutes, all of the propellant is consumed and the boosters burn out and separate at an altitude of 28 miles and speed of 3,100 mph.

The boosters coast upward to a 41-mile altitude, then parachute back to the Atlantic Ocean about 140 miles from the launch site.

After splashdown, NASA's recovery ships, Liberty Star and Freedom Star, tow the boosters back to Cape Canaveral for disassembly and recycling.

The motors are returned to Utah for final cleaning, inspection and propellant reloading.

The booster subassemblies (the frustum, forward skirt and aft skirt) go to the United Space Alliance Assembly and Refurbishment Facility at Kennedy.

The parachutes are refurbished at Kennedy's Parachute Refurbishment Facility.

Source : Nasa